North Shoreview Montessori

Throughout the year, North Shoreview Montessori (NSM) has a number of special events.

Book Fairs

Three times a year, Scholastic Books delivers racks filled with books that are offered for sale to students. Teachers post wish lists so that parents may purchase books for their children’s classroom. Proceeds from these fundraisers are used to purchase books for the school library. The book fairs are open before school, during recess, and after school.

Dad's Pancake Breakfast

Join us in October for our annual Dad's Pancake Breakfast. It's a great chance to meet some of your children's friends and other families at our school. Plus you don't want to miss seeing the fathers of NSM working in the kitchen!

Equinox Celebrations

In celebration of both the fall and spring equinoxes in September and March, students celebrate the change of seasons with poems, short plays, or songs during a Friday morning assembly. Parents are encouraged to attend.

Fall International Potluck

Kick off the new school year by attending the annual Fall International Potluck. Join NSM families for an evening of socializing, eating, and dance entertainment. Because our school is rich in cultural diversity, the potluck has always had a delicious international flair. The evening is finished with an amazing night of international dance performances put on by NSM's own students, including American hip-hop, Brazilian samba, traditional Japanese dancing, Mexican folk dancing, and dances of the Hawaiian and Pacific Islands. It's a show not to be missed.

Greens and Grounds Days

A few times a year, parents are asked to devote some Saturday time to paint, repair, clean, garden, and reorganize the school. Children are welcome to join in and work alongside their parents. These are fun community-building events with the added satisfaction of helping keep our school clean, maintained, and attractive.

Historical Timeline and Halloween Celebration

The Historical Timeline is a longtime favorite NSM tradition and is held in October before the morning Halloween parade. It is an opportunity for students in grades two through seven to choose a historical figure, living or dead, to do research on this person, and to then dress as this person. The students start off the event by giving presentations in their classrooms about the historical figure they elected to represent. Then the whole school comes together in our gym and participating students are then individually called up to the stage in timeline order, where they identify themselves. It is wonderful to see history come alive. Students in kindergarten through second grade are asked to be good audiences and watch to see what will be expected of them when they reach third grade. All students are encouraged to use their historical figure costumes for the morning parade.

Math Night

Each year, we host our annual Math Night where children and parents explore math games together. The concept originated at University of California, Berkeley, Lawrence Hall of Science as Math Around the World. It brings a unique and entertaining style of exploratory hands-on learning directly to our community.

Thanksgiving Assembly

Each fall, students take time during their cultural studies to learn more about why we celebrate Thanksgiving. In the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, North Shoreview Montessori students create a bag filled with items to give to other children in our community who are in need.  The children present these gifts to representatives of Samaritan House during our Thanksgiving Gathering. The entire audience sings songs of Thanksgiving and individual classrooms may perform plays, poetry, or Native American dances for the celebration.

Skate Nights

Join us in December and January for an evening of family fun at a local ice rink. This is an event for students, siblings, parents, and teachers. The kids love seeing each other outside of the school grounds, and it's a great way to get some exercise and have an excuse to indulge in some after-skating hot chocolate!

Literacy Week & Pajama Night

The entire school and their families are invited to come to the school. Stories are shared, a number of classrooms have read-alouds, crafts are made, children make their own ice cream sundaes, and lots of fun is had.

Science Fair

The purpose of the Science Fair is to stimulate in our students an active interest in science; to provide educational experiences that are positive and enriching; to give public recognition and encouragement to students who are interested in science; and to give students at NSM an opportunity to be recognized for extended academic effort. Any NSM student in kindergarten through fifth grade may enter the Science Fair. Suggestions for projects include collections, experiments, demonstrations, plant and animal study, and environmental protection.

Spring Carnival and Earth Day

To encourage conservation and to celebrate Earth Day, our school comes together as a community to clean up the North Shoreview neighborhood and to raise money for our school. We ask that each student (not parents) obtain sponsors for collecting trash. One hundred percent of the funds raised directly benefit our school, thus benefiting our children and their education. Immediately following the walk, the families enjoy the Spring Carnival which provides games, food and entertainment from our own student steel drum band. Traditionally, many classrooms pick a theme and creates a quilt around their idea; quilts are raffled off as an additional fundraiser.

Founders' Day

In June, the school community gathers together to celebrate the founding of the Parent-Teacher Association (PTA) as well as the establishment of our Montessori program. Each year during this time, our school honors our outstanding citizens with an Honorary Service Award. Recipients are individuals who have given many hours of their time serving our school and include a special teacher award, a parent "volunteer of the year" award, and a fifth grade family award. These individuals are selected from nominations submitted by the entire school community.

Variety Show

On the last day of the school year, all NSM students are given an opportunity to demonstrate their talents before the whole school. The accomplishments of our students are amazing. Past performances have included singing, dancing, hula hoop, piano, drums, clarinet, puppets, poems, dramatic readings, karate, gymnastics, baton twirling, mime, skits, and magic, among many other talents.